


Everywhere to Run, Nowhere to Hide

by littlefirebird



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: F/F, Mentions of Blood, allagan relic tries healing instead of maiming for once, it doesn't end well, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-25 22:54:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20732051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlefirebird/pseuds/littlefirebird
Summary: A lance didn’t need magic to be wielded, nor did an axe, or sword, or knives, or any other multitude of bladed weapons.  A year ago, she was fundamentally broken, useless.Maybe she should have stayed that way.





	1. Chapter 1

Why was she even trying? Healing was a job for gentler people, not…monsters.

Monsters were meant to fight.

That’s what she really was, wasn’t she? A monster?

The physical wounds had healed, but Kyrene still heard staticked whispers and taunting laughter in her dreams. Even in the waking world at times.

So why bother with healing? Why bother with globes and cards and constellations when it was clear she was better suited to ripping and tearing, and rending flesh from bone? Every run that someone collapsed from their wounds, she got frustrated. Angry. Why play at healing?

Why pretend to be a sheep when it’s clear you’re a wolf?

_‘Yes, why bother?’ _The staticky voice cooed. _‘You were meant to subdue and kill. Why don’t you go back to doing that?’ _

Bleary eyes tracked back and forth, switching between any of the gyrating disks of her current star globe as it spun. Every so often, the timing was just right and she would catch sight of her own eyes–permanently stained white-green– looking back at her.

A year ago, the magicked metals wouldn’t gently turn even at her most desperate coaxing. A lance didn’t need magic to be wielded, nor did an axe, or sword, or knives, or any other multitude of bladed weapons. A year ago, she was fundamentally broken, useless.

** _Maybe she should have stayed that way. _ **

…no. no no no No No NO _NO **NO**_!

The globe sped up at the sudden influx of energy, Kyrene’s hand balling into a fist so tightly that her knuckles turned white and her nails dug into her skin.

_‘Yes, get angry. Lash out like the beast you are.’_ The scientist’s voice echoed. The woman was dead, and yet she still haunted the relic, her voice fading in and out and skipping like an orchestrion roll with the ink scratched through.

“Shut up.” Kyrene’s lower lip trembled, her voice meek and timid. “_Shut up_, I’m _not_…a beast.” Her clenched fist slowly relaxed, but she was shaking. The astrometer clattered to the ground, the ever-present cards scattering with it. “I’m _not_.”

_She had everywhere to run, but nowhere to go._

“I’m t-trying…so hard.” A shuddering exhale, and the relic curled tighter to herself, one arm wrapping around her legs to her chest, the other tightly gripping the hair at the back of her head.

_It didn’t matter. Everybody else could tell. They could see through her deception. The little Au Ra she’d given Allagan silver pieces to, the Ananta and Kojin tribes, the Centurio clan members, anybody she’d helped in battle–or tried to. Some could hide their discomfort, others could not._

Even Nhagi.

_ Even **Nhagi**. _

Kyrene trembled again, her gut churning unpleasantly. _That was her fault. Kyrene’s fault. Nhagi shouldn’t have circuits, shouldn’t have that branding. Enkhtuyaa shouldn’t have circuits, shouldn’t have that branding. They didn’t deserve that happening to them. It was all her fault. **It was all her fault.**_

What was she doing, running around with a star globe, pretending to have some semblance of control over fate, when she only dragged the people joined to her down, or pushed them away?

_ Maybe she would be better off losing herself in the Wilds. Just go back to being a mindless beast. One of those hunt marks that stalks the lands. _

_What was she doing…? _

…the hand at the back of her head loosened, and joined the other wrapped around her legs. The relic stared ahead blankly at the far wall, ignoring everything else and mumbling–

_“…Maybe.”_


	2. Chapter 2

_Everywhere to run. Nowhere to go. _

Outer La Noscea. Ruins. Hovel. Nobody in their right mind went there on a regular basis.

Empty, it should be Empty.

_ It was not. The ‘intruders’ were chased out, and their clothes thrown out after them. _

_Officers at Maelstrom’s Camp Outlook later received a tip from two adventurers reporting a ‘woman touched with madness tore apart the Hermit’s Hovel and claimed to have seen scales ripple across the woman’s arms. Investigation inconclusive, although a Private did report hearing something like a loud screech, and the hovel was, indeed, torn apart. _

_**Not safe. Nowhere to go.** _

_Run. **Run. **_

Churning Mists. Floating shards. Dravanians. Peace not yet settled. A former home. Nobody in their right mind should be there. Moogles didn’t count.

_ It was quieter here. Cleaner. The haze of water aether wasn’t nearly as suffocating. _

_It was not empty either. Kyrene forgot about the Centurio clan marks, about the crafting moogles sending adventurers on quests. _

_She forgot that people knew about one of her ‘hiding’ spots here. _

** _Not safe. Nowhere to go. _ **

_Run. **Run. **_

Gyr Abania? No. Too many people knew her, recognized her.

Othard? No. She was already approaching something of a legend.

What did that leave?

Azys Lla? Her birthplace, and home to so many other<strike>monster</strike>s like her?

_Nobody would complain if the Garleans stationed on the Gamma Quadrant were to be diminished in count, right? A monster amongst monsters? Should she remand herself to exile, like Tiamat? Give up, and give in? Resign herself to the maddened cries of the Allagan amalgamates? _

_Tiamat wouldn’t talk to her. Dragons had long memories, and even if the stink of her brood’s blood had long since washed off, she would remember that Kyrene was there, all those millenia ago, at the battle her mate was slain. _

** _Why did it matter? There was nowhere to go. _ **

** _Keep running, coward. _ **

…the frozen wastes of Ishgard. She could go there. Expend her energy. Fall into sleep, and remain frozen, but not dead. Never dead. She couldn’t do that to Nhagi. Couldn’t do that to anyone.

_‘Grown attached, have you?’ The echo cackled. ‘If you expend your energy, it’ll draw from that whore you call your own.’ _

“N-…Nnnn–”

** _Nowhere to go. _ **

** _No escape. _ **

** _If she stayed in the ice, Nhagi would be bled dry. _ **

** _She couldn’t do that. _ **

_The freezing winds of the Coerthas Western Highlands stung at her eyes and skin as she floated in the air far above. Ice crystals began to form along her skin and clothing. The relic shivered. _

** _“I don’t want to be a monster anymore.”_ **


	3. Chapter 3

_Nowhere to go…so where could she hide?_

She tried. She really did. Tried using the Diurnal Sect. The warm one, the soft one. The gentle pulse of magic did nothing to soothe the ever-growing irritation, the anger. Heal the kitsune’s anger, her wrath, soothe the beast.

Maybe the relic was just too much of a monster to have the same happen to her.

_How did it happen?_

Kyrene now sat tucked away in the lower level of her…home? She still struggled to think of anything as such. The furnishings had been slowly pieced back together, set back in each of their places since…_her_. 

But one storm had replaced another. The blood covering her was fresh enough from the teleport that her boots left prints from her staggering path to the downstairs, to the darkest corner she could think of. Handprints lined the wall when she hadn’t been steady enough to right herself otherwise, and smudges from her shoulder down the stairwell. 

_Why…did she keep trying?_

Astrology… Astromancy… were supposed to help one take_ charge_ of their fate. To _control_ it.

So if Kyrene was here, cowering in her basement, covered with blood…did that mean that was the fate she wanted?

Never destined to heal, only to harm?

_So she should give up…right?_

The relic flinched upon hearing the sliding door open to her hiding place.

“…Love?”

Kyrene shivered, and tried to curl further into herself. What a sight she must be– covered head to toe in drying blood and looking for all the world like a frightened child. Eikonslayer, feller of man and beast, huntress in her own right…and yet refusing to look up at the one person who stayed at her side the longest of anyone before.

“Kyrene?” Nhagi softly tried again, crouching before the Roegadyn. “Are you alright?”

The relic’s grip tightened where her hands rested on her legs. In all of this, somehow… this was the first she felt the warm prick of tears beginning to well up in her eyes.

“…It’s not mine.” Kyrene finally mumbled into the bloodied fabric of her himation.

“That’s…good.” An odd pause accented by the quiet swish of the Keeper’s tail. 

_Kyrene knew what the sound of clinking earrings meant. Nhagi was worried. Unsure._

“Would you like to talk about it?” Nhagi tilted her head to try and make some sort of eye contact. No such luck. _Just like Kyrene. Stubborn to the last._ The Miqo’te exhaled and stood. “I’m going to get some warm water and a cloth, okay? I’ll be right back.”

_Nhagi wanted to reach out, touch her, reassure her, but everything was telling her right now that Kyrene would just retreat further away._

She had only just stepped away when–

“…She was right.”

One ear flicked back, acknowledging the relic.

Quieter. “Aoife was right.” 

Nhagi didn’t immediately respond. If Kyrene responded before she got back with the water, that was well and good. If not…

“Why do you say that, love?” The small wooden tub clunked against the flooring as she set it down. “What would that wretched woman have gotten right?”

“I’ll…never be more than a beast pretending to be a person.” _Never more than an instrument of war_. “I’m only good for killing.”

“…I think…if that were true, you might not have tried to be a healer.” The washcloth was dunked and wrung. “You would not have given yourself to fight alongside everyone you have. Wouldn’t a beast only think of conquering? Wouldn’t a beast discard anybody weaker?”

A sharp inhale at the gentlest touch to her hand, softly prying the relic’s fingers from the grip with ease.

“You are skilled at battle, that’s true.” Nhagi murmured, wiping the blood carefully away from Kyrene’s hand. “You are also incredibly gentle, and for every moment of ferocity, I have seen ten more of tenderness.” A pause to rinse and wring the cloth once more. “I would not call you a beast, for you cherish those you consider friends, as they do you.”

“But…I failed. I’m not cut out to be a healer.”

_Ah, there were her eyes. Fixated on their hands, but at least no longer hiding._

“Not everybody is, dear. I tried myself a long time ago. I can say with some certainty you’ve learned far more than I will ever have the patience for.” A tiny smile as the relic’s fingers began to curl around hers. “Am I also a beast for being better suited for things other than healing?”

“You?” What a strange combination of fear and confusion in her eyes. “N-No, never–”

“Then why would you be one?”

“…I…” Kyrene stuttered, her eyes darting briefly away in panic. “I don’t…”

“Maybe…you once were, but what matters is the you in front of me right now.” Nhagi cupped Kyrene’s cheek gently–blood and all–and gently wiped a tear away with her thumb. “I wouldn’t have anybody else by my side.”


End file.
